Chapter X (2)

Such is the account which Thucydidês gives of the original severalty and subsequent consolidation of the different portions of Attica. Of the general fact there is no reason to doubt, though the operative cause assigned by the historian,—the power and sagacity of Theseus,—belongs to legend and not to history. Nor can we pretend to determine either the real steps by which such a change was brought about, or its date, or the number of portions which went to constitute the full-grown Athens,—farther enlarged at some early period, though we do not know when, by voluntary junction of the Bœotian, or semi-Bœotian, town Eleutheræ, situated among the valleys of Kithærôn between Eleusis and Platæa. It was the standing habit of the population of Attica, even down to the Peloponnesian war,[112] to reside in their several cantons, where their ancient festivals and temples yet continued as relics of a state of previous autonomy: their visits to the city were made only at special times, for purposes religious or political, and they yet looked upon the country residence as their real home. How deep-seated this cantonal feeling was among them, we may see by the fact that it survived the temporary exile forced upon them by the Persian invasion, and was resumed when the expulsion of that destroying host enabled them to rebuild their ruined dwellings in Attica.[113]

[112] Pausan. i, 2, 4; 38, 2; Diodor. Sicul. iv, 2; Schol. ad
Aristophan. Acharn. 242.

The Athenians transferred from Eleutheræ to Athens both a
venerable statue of Dionysus and a religious ceremony in honor
of that god. The junction of the town with Athens is stated by
Pausanias to have taken place in consequence of the hatred of
its citizens for Thebes, and must have occurred before 509 B.
C., about which period we find Hysiæ to be the frontier deme of
Attica (Herodot. v, 72; vi, 108).

[113] Thucyd. ii, 15, 16. οὐδὲν ἄλλο ἢ πόλιν τὴν ἑαυτοῦ ἀπολείπων
ἕκαστος,—respecting the Athenians from the country who were
driven into Athens at the first invasion during the Peloponnesian
war.

How many of the demes recognized by Kleisthenês had originally separate governments, or in what local aggregates they stood combined, we cannot now make out; it will be recollected that the city of Athens itself contained several demes, and Peiræeus also formed a deme apart. Some of the twelve divisions, which Philochorus ascribes to Kekrops, present probable marks of an ancient substantive existence,—Kekropia, or the region surrounding and including the city and acropolis; the tetrapolis, composed of Œnoê, Trikorythus, Probalinthus, and Marathon;[114] Eleusis; Aphidnæ and Dekeleia,[115] both distinguished by their peculiar mythical connection with Sparta and the Dioskuri. But it is difficult to imagine that Phalêrum, which is one of the separate divisions named by Philochorus, can ever have enjoyed an autonomy apart from Athens. Moreover, we find among some of the demes which Philochorus does not notice, evidences of standing antipathies, and prohibitions of intermarriage, which might seem to indicate that these had once been separate little states.[116] Though in most cases we can infer little from the legends and religious ceremonies which nearly every deme[117] had peculiar to itself, yet those of Eleusis are so remarkable, as to establish the probable autonomy of that township down to a comparatively late period. The Homeric Hymn to Dêmêtêr, recounting the visit of that goddess to Eleusis after the abduction of her daughter, and the first establishment of the Eleusinian ceremonies, specifies the eponymous prince Eleusis, and the various chiefs of the place,—Keleos, Triptolemus, Dioklês, and Eumolpus; it also notices the Rharian plain in the neighborhood of Eleusis, but not the least allusion is made to Athens or to any concern of the Athenians in the presence or worship of the goddess. There is reason to believe that at the time when this Hymn was composed, Eleusis was an independent town: what that time was we have no means of settling, though Voss puts it as low as the 30th Olympiad.[118] And the proof hence derived is so much the more valuable, because the Hymn to Dêmêtêr presents a coloring strictly special and local; moreover, the story told by Solon to Crœsus, respecting Tellus the Athenian, who perished in battle against the neighboring townsmen of Eleusis,[119] assumes, in like manner, the independence of the latter in earlier times. Nor is it unimportant to notice that, even so low as 300 B. C., the observant visitor Dikæarchus professes to detect a difference between the native Athenians and the Atticans, as well in physiognomy as in character and taste.[120]

[114] Etymologicon Magn. v. Ἐπακρία χωρά; Strabo, viii, p. 383;
Stephan. Byz. v. Τετράπολις.

The τετράκωμοι comprised the four demes, Πειραῖεις, Φαληρεῖς,
Ξυπετεῶνες, Θυμοίταδαι (Pollux, iv, 105): whether this is an
old division, however, has been doubted (see Ilgen, De Tribubus
Atticis, p. 51).

The Ἐπακρέων τριττὺς is mentioned in an inscription apud Ross
(Die Demen von Attika, p. vi). Compare Boeckh ad Corp. Inscr. No.
82: among other demes, it comprised the deme Plôtheia. Mesogæa
also (or rather the Mesogei, οἱ Μεσόγειοι) appears as a communion
for sacrifice and religious purposes, and as containing the deme
Batê. See Inscriptiones Atticæ nuper repertæ duodecim, by Ern.
Curtius; Berlin, 1843; Inscript. i, p. 3. The exact site of the
deme Batê in Attica is unknown (Ross, Die Demen von Attica, p.
64); and respecting the question, what portion of Attica was
called Mesogæa, very different conjectures have been started,
which there appears to be no means of testing. Compare Schömann
de Comitiis, p. 343, and Wordsworth, Athens and Attica, p. 229,
2d edit.

[115] Dikæarchus, Fragm. p. 109, ed. Fuhr; Plutarch, Theseus, c.
33.

[116] Such as that between the Pallenæans and Agnusians
(Plutarch, Theseus, 12).

Acharnæ was the largest and most populous deme in Attica
(see Ross, Die Demen von Attika, p. 62; Thucyd. ii, 21); yet
Philochorus does not mention it as having ever constituted a
substantive πόλις.

Several of the demes seem to have stood in repute for peculiar
qualities, good or bad: see Aristophan. Acharn. 177, with
Elmsley’s note.

[117] Strabo, ix, p. 396; Plutarch, Theseus, 14. Polemo had
written a book expressly on the eponymous heroes of the Attic
demes and tribes (Preller. Polemonis Fragm. p. 42): the
Atthidographers were all rich on the same subject: see the
Fragments of the Atthis of Hellanikus (p. 24, ed. Preller), also
those of Istrus, Philochorus, etc.

[118] J. H. Voss, Erlaüterungen, p. 1: see the Hymn, 96-106,
451-475: compare Hermesianax ap. Athen. xiii, p. 597.

[119] Herodot. i, 30.

[120] Dikæarch. Vita Græciæ, p. 141, Fragm. ed. Fuhr.

In the history set forth to us of the proceedings of Theseus, no mention is made of these four Ionic tribes; but another and a totally different distribution of the people into eupatridæ, geômori, and demiurgi, which he is said to have first introduced, is brought to our notice; Dionysius of Halikarnassus gives only a double division,—eupatridæ and dependent cultivators; corresponding to his idea of the patricians and clients in early Rome.[121] As far as we can understand this triple distinction, it seems to be disparate and unconnected with the four tribes above mentioned. The eupatridæ are the wealthy and powerful men, belonging to the most distinguished families in all the various gentes, and principally living in the city of Athens, after the consolidation of Attica: from them are distinguished the middling and lower people, roughly classified into husbandmen and artisans. To the eupatridæ, is ascribed a religious as well as a political and social ascendency; they are represented as the source of all authority on matters both sacred and profane;[122] they doubtless comprised those gentes, such as the Butadæ, whose sacred ceremonies were looked upon with the greatest reverence by the people: and we may conceive Eumolpus, Keleos, Dioklês, etc., as they are described in the Homeric Hymn to Dêmêtêr, in the character of eupatridæ of Eleusis. The humbler gentes, and the humbler members of each gens, would appear in this classification confounded with that portion of the people who belonged to no gens at all.

[121] Plutarch, Theseus, c. 25: Dionys. Hal. ii, 8.

[122] Etymologic. Magn. Εὐπατρίδαι—οἱ αὐτὸ τὸ ἄστυ οἰκοῦντες, καὶ
μετέχοντες τοῦ βασιλικοῦ γένους, καὶ τὴν τῶν ἱερῶν ἐπιμέλειαν
ποιούμενοι. The βασιλικὸν γένος includes not only the Kodrids,
but also the Erechtheids, Pandionids, Pallantids, etc. See also
Plutarch, Theseus, c. 24; Hesychius, Ἀγροιῶται.

Yet Isokratês seems to speak of the great family of the
Alkmæonidæ as _not_ included among the eupatridæ. (Orat. xvi, De
Bigis, p. 351, p. 506, Bek.)

From these eupatridæ exclusively, and doubtless by their selection, the nine annual archons—probably also the prytanes of the naukrari—were taken. That the senate of areopagus was formed of members of the same order, we may naturally presume: the nine archons all passed into it at the expiration of their year of office, subject only to the condition of having duly passed the test of accountability; and they remained members for life. These are the only political authorities of whom we hear in the earliest imperfectly known period of the Athenian government, after the discontinuance of the king, and the adoption of the annual change of archons. The senate of areopagus seems to represent the Homeric council of old men;[123] and there were doubtless, on particular occasions, general assemblies of the people, with the same formal and passive character as the Homeric agora,—at least, we shall observe traces of such assemblies anterior to the Solonian legislation. Some of the writers of antiquity ascribed the first establishment of the senate of areopagus to Solon, just as there were also some who considered Lykurgus as having first brought together the Spartan gerusia. But there can be little doubt that this is a mistake, and that the senate of areopagus is a primordial institution, of immemorial antiquity, though its constitution as well as its functions underwent many changes. It stood at first alone as a permanent and collegiate authority, originally by the side of the kings and afterwards by the side of the archons: it would then of course be known by the title of _The_ Boulê,—_The_ Senate, or council; its distinctive title, “Senate of Areopagus,” borrowed from the place where its sittings were held, would not be bestowed until the formation by Solon of the second senate, or council, from which there was need to discriminate it.

[123] Meier und Schömann, Der Attische Prozess. Einleitung, p. 10.

This seems to explain the reason why it was never mentioned in the ordinances of Drako, whose silence supplied one argument in favor of the opinion that it did not exist in his time, and that it was first constituted by Solon.[124] We hear of the senate of areopagus chiefly as a judicial tribunal, because it acted in this character constantly throughout Athenian history, and because the orators have most frequent occasion to allude to its decisions on matters of trial. But its functions were originally of the widest senatorial character, directive generally as well as judicial. And although the gradual increase of democracy at Athens, as will be hereafter explained, both abridged its powers and contributed still farther comparatively to lower it, by enlarging the direct working of the people in assembly and judicature, as well as that of the senate of Five Hundred, which was a permanent adjunct and adminicle of the public assembly,—yet it seems to have been, even down to the time of Periklês, the most important body in the state. And after it had been cast into the background by the political reforms of that great man, we still find it on particular occasions stepping forward to reassert its ancient powers, and to assume for the moment that undefined interference which it had enjoyed without dispute in antiquity. The attachment of the Athenians to their ancient institutions gave to the senate of areopagus a constant and powerful hold on their minds, and this feeling was rather strengthened than weakened when it ceased to be an object of popular jealousy,—when it could no longer be employed as an auxiliary of oligarchical pretensions.

[124] Plutarch, Solon, c. 19; Aristotle, Polit. ii. 9, 2; Cicero,
De Offic. i. 22. Pollux seems to follow the opinion that Solon
first instituted the senate of areopagus (viii, 125).

Of the nine archons, whose number continued unaltered from 638 B. C. to the end of the free democracy, three bore special titles,—the archon eponymus, from whose name the designation of the year was derived, and who was spoken of as _The Archon_; the archon basileus (king), or more frequently, the basileus; and the polemarch. The remaining six passed by the general title of Thesmothetæ. Of the first three, each possessed exclusive judicial competence in regard to certain special matters: the thesmothetæ were in this respect all on a par, acting sometimes as a board, sometimes individually. The archon eponymus determined all disputes relative to the family, the gentile, and the phratric relations: he was the legal protector of orphans and widows.[125] The archon basileus, or king archon, enjoyed competence in complaints respecting offences against the religious sentiment and respecting homicide. The polemarch, speaking of times anterior to Kleisthenês, was the leader of the military force and judge in disputes between citizens and non-citizens. Moreover, each of these three archons had particular religious festivals assigned to him, which it was his duty to superintend and conduct. The six thesmothetæ seem to have been judges in disputes and complaints, generally, against citizens, saving the special matters reserved for the cognizance of the first two archons. According to the proper sense of the word thesmothetæ, all the nine archons were entitled to be so called,[126] though the first three had especial designations of their own: the word thesmoi, analogous to the themistes[127] of Homer, includes in its meaning both general laws and particular sentences,—the two ideas not being yet discriminated, and the general law being conceived only in its application to some particular case. Drako was the first thesmothet who was called upon to set down his thesmoi in writing, and thus to invest them essentially with a character of more or less generality.

[125] Pollux, viii, 89-91.

[126] We read the θεσμοθέτων ἀνάκρισις in Demosthen. cont.
Eubulidem, c. 17, p. 1319, and Pollux, viii, 85; a series of
questions which it was necessary for them to answer before they
were admitted to occupy their office. Similar questions must have
been put to the archon, the basileus, and the polemarch: so that
the words θεσμοθέτων ἀνάκρισις may reasonably be understood to
apply to all the nine archons, as, indeed, we find the words τοὺς
ἐννέα ἄρχοντας ἀνακρίνετε shortly afterwards, p. 1320.

[127] Respecting the word θέμιστες in the Homeric sense, see
above, vol. ii, ch. xx.

Both Aristotle (Polit. ii, 9, 9) and Dêmosthenês (contr. Euerg.
et Mnêsibul. c. 18, p. 1161) call the ordinances of Drako νόμοι,
not θεσμοί. Andokidês distinguishes the θεσμοὶ of Drako and
the νόμοι of Solon (De Mysteriis, p. 11). This is the adoption
of a phrase comparatively modern; Solon called his own laws
θεσμοί. The oath of the περίπολοι ἔφηβοι (the youth who formed
the armed police of Attica during the first two years of their
military age), as given in Pollux (viii, 106), seems to contain
at least many ancient phrases: this phrase,—καὶ τοῖς θεσμοῖς
τοῖς ἱδρυμένοις πείσομαι,—is remarkable, as it indicates the
ancient association of religious sanction which adhered to the
word θεσμοί; for ἱδρύεσθαι is the word employed in reference to
the establishment and domiciliation of the gods who protected
the country,—θέσθαι νόμους is the later expression for making
laws. Compare Stobæus De Republic. xliii, 48, ed. Gaisford, and
Dêmosthen. cont. Makartat. c. 13, p. 1069.

In the later and better-known times of Athenian law, we find these archons deprived in great measure of their powers of judging and deciding, and restricted to the task of first hearing the parties and collecting the evidence, next, of introducing the matter for trial into the appropriate dikastery, over which they presided. Originally, there was no separation of powers: the archons both judged and administered, sharing among themselves those privileges which had once been united in the hands of the king, and probably accountable at the end of their year of office to the senate of areopagus. It is probable also, that the functions of that senate, and those of the prytanes of the naukrars, were of the same double and confused nature. All of these functionaries belonged to the eupatrids, and all of them doubtless acted more or less in the narrow interest of their order: moreover, there was ample room for favoritism, in the way of connivance as well as antipathy, on the part of the archons. That such was decidedly the case, and that discontent began to be serious, we may infer from the duty imposed on the thesmothet Drako, B. C. 624, to put in writing the thesmoi, or ordinances, so that they might be “shown publicly,” and known beforehand.[128] He did not meddle with the political constitution, and in his ordinances Aristotle finds little worthy of remark except the extreme severity[129] of the punishments awarded: petty thefts, or even proved idleness of life, being visited with death or disfranchisement.

[128] Ὅτε θεσμὸς ~ἐφάνη ὅδε~,—such is the exact expression of
Solon’s law (Plutarch, Solon, c. 19); the word θεσμὸς is found in
Solon’s own poems, θεσμοὺς δ᾽ ὁμοίους τῷ κακῷ τε κἀγαθῷ.

[129] Aristot. Polit. ii, 9, 9; Rhetoric. ii. 25, 1; Aulus Gell.
N. A. xi, 18; Pausanias, ix, 36, 4; Plutarch, Solon, c. 19;
though Pollux (viii, 42) does not agree with him. Taylor, Lectt.
Lysiacæ, ch. 10.

Respecting the θεσμοὶ of Drako, see Kuhn. ad Ælian. V. II. viii,
10. The preliminary sentence which Porphyry (De Abstinentiâ, iv,
22) ascribes to Drako can hardly be genuine.

But we are not to construe this remark as demonstrating any special inhumanity in the character of Drako, who was not invested with the large power which Solon afterwards enjoyed, and cannot be imagined to have imposed upon the community severe laws of his own invention. Himself of course an eupatrid, he set forth in writing such ordinances as the eupatrid archons had before been accustomed to enforce without writing, in the particular cases which came before them; and the general spirit of penal legislation had become so much milder, during the two centuries which followed, that these old ordinances appeared to Aristotle intolerably rigorous. Probably neither Drako, nor the Lokrian Zaleukus, who somewhat preceded him in date, were more rigorous than the sentiment of the age: indeed, the few fragments of the Drakonian tables which have reached us, far from exhibiting indiscriminate cruelty, introduce, for the first time, into the Athenian law, mitigating distinctions in respect to homicide;[130] founded on the variety of concomitant circumstances. He is said to have constituted the judges called Ephetæ, fifty-one elders belonging to some respected gens or possessing an exalted position, who held their sittings for trial of homicide in three different spots, according to the difference of the cases submitted to them. If the accused party, admitting the fact, denied any culpable intention and pleaded accident, the case was tried at the place called the palladium; when found guilty of accidental homicide, he was condemned to a temporary exile, unless he could appease the relatives of the deceased, but his property was left untouched. If, again, admitting the fact, he defended himself by some valid ground of justification, such as self-defence, or flagrant adultery with his wife on the part of the deceased, the trial took place on ground consecrated to Apollo and Artemis, called the Delphinium. A particular spot called the Phreattys, close to the sea-shore, was also named for the trial of a person, who, while under sentence of exile for an unintentional homicide, might be charged with a second homicide, committed of course without the limits of the territory: being considered as impure from the effects of the former sentence, he was not permitted to set foot on the soil, but stood his trial on a boat hauled close in shore. At the prytaneium, or government-house itself, sittings were held by the four phylo-basileis, or tribe-kings, to try any inanimate object (a piece of wood or stone, etc.) which had caused death to any one, without the proved intervention of a human hand: the wood or stone, when the fact was verified, was formally cast beyond the border.[131] All these distinctions of course imply the preliminary investigation of the case, called anakrisis, by the king-archon, in order that it might be known what was the issue, and where the sittings of the ephetæ were to be held.

[130] Pausanias, ix, 36, 4. Δράκοντος Ἀθηναίοις θεσμοθετήσαντος
ἐκ τῶν ἐκείνου κατέστη νόμων οὓς ἔγραφεν ἐπὶ τῆς ἀρχῆς, ἄλλων
τε ὁπόσων ἄδειαν εἶναι χρή, καὶ δὴ καὶ τιμωρίας μοιχοῦ: compare
Dêmosthen. cont. Aristokrat. p. 637; Lysias de Cæde Eratosthen.
p. 31.

[131] Harpokration, vv. Ἐφέται, Ἐπὶ Δελφινίῳ, Ἐπὶ Παλλαδίῳ,
Ἐν Φρεαττοῖ; Pollux, viii, 119, 124, 125; Photius, v. Ἐφέται;
Hesychius, ἐς Φρέατου; Dêmosthen. cont. Aristokrat. c. 15-18, pp.
642-645; cont. Makartat. c. 13, p. 1068. When Pollux speaks of
the five courts in which the ephetæ judged, he probably includes
the areopagus (see Dêmosth. cont. Aristokrat. c. 14, p. 641).

About the judges ἐν Φρεαττοῖ, see Aristot. Polit. iv, 13, 2.
On the general subject of this ancient and obscure criminal
procedure, see Matthiæ, De Judiciis Atheniensium (in Miscellan.
Philologie, vol. i, p. 143, _seq._); also Schömann, Antiq. Jur.
Pub. Att. sect. 61, p. 288; Platner, Prozess und Klagen bey den
Attikern, b. i, ch. 1; and E. W. Weber, Comment. ad Dêmosthen.
cont. Aristokrat. pp. 627, 641; Meier und Schömann, Attisch.
Prozess, pp. 14-19.

I cannot consider the ephetæ as judges in appeal, and I agree
with those (Schömann, Antiq. Jur. Pub. Gr. p. 171; Meier und
Schömann, Attisch. Prozess, p. 16; Platner, Prozess und Klagen,
t. i, p. 18) who distrust the etymology which connects this word
with ἐφέσιμος. The active sense of the word, akin to ἐφίεμαι
(Æsch. Prom. 4) and ἐφετμὴ, meets the case better: see O. Müller,
Prolegg. ad Mythol. p. 424 (though there is no reason for
believing the ephetæ to be older than Drako): compare, however,
K. F. Hermann, Lehrbuch der Griechischen Staats Alterthümer,
sects. 103, 104, who thinks differently.

The trial, condemnation, and banishment of inanimate objects
which had been the cause of death, was founded on feelings widely
diffused throughout the Grecian world (see Pausan. vi, 11, 2;
and Theokritus, Idyll, xxiii, 60): analogous in principle to the
English law respecting deodand, and to the spirit pervading the
ancient Germanic codes generally (see Dr. C. Trümmer, Die Lehre
von der Zurechnung, c. 28-38. Hamburg, 1845).

The Germanic codes do not content themselves with imposing a
general obligation to appease the relatives and gentiles of the
slain party, but determine beforehand the sum which shall be
sufficient to the purpose, which, in the case of involuntary
homicide, is paid to the surviving relatives as a compensation;
for the difference between culpable homicide, justifiable
homicide, and accidental homicide, see the elaborate treatise
of Wilda, Das Deutsche Strafrecht, ch. viii, pp. 544-559, whose
doctrine, however, is disputed by Dr. Trümmer, in the treatise
above noticed.

At Rome, according to the Twelve Tables, and earlier, involuntary
homicide was to be expiated by the sacrifice of a ram (Walter,
Geschichte des Römisch. Rechts, sect. 768).

So intimately was the mode of dealing with homicide connected with the religious feelings of the Athenians, that these old regulations were never formally abrogated throughout the historical times, and were read engraved on their column by the contemporaries of Dêmosthenês.[132] The areopagus continued in judicial operation, and the ephetæ are spoken of as if they were so, even through the age of Dêmosthenês; though their functions were tacitly usurped or narrowed, and their dignity impaired,[133] by the more popular dikasteries afterwards created. It is in this way that they have become known to us, while the other Drakonian institutions have perished: but there is much obscurity respecting them, particularly in regard to the relation between the ephetæ and the areopagites. Indeed, so little was known on the subject, even by the historical inquirers of Athens, that most of them supposed the council of areopagus to have received its first origin from Solon: and even Aristotle, though he contradicts this view, expresses himself in no very positive language.[134] That judges sat at the areopagus for the trial of homicide, previous to Drako, seems implied in the arrangements of that lawgiver respecting the ephetæ, inasmuch as he makes no new provision for trying the direct issue of intentional homicide, which, according to all accounts, fell within the cognizance of the areopagus: but whether the ephetæ and the areopagites were the same persons, wholly or partially, our information is not sufficient to discover. Before Drako, there existed no tribunal for trying homicide, except the senate, sitting at the areopagus, and we may conjecture that there was something connected with that spot,—legends, ceremonies, or religious feelings,—which compelled judges there sitting to condemn every man proved guilty of homicide, and forbade them to take account of extenuating or justifying circumstances.[135] Drako appointed the ephetæ to sit at different places; and these places are so pointedly marked, and were so unalterably maintained, that we may see in how peculiar a manner those special issues, of homicide under particular circumstances, which he assigned to each, were adapted, in Athenian belief, to the new sacred localities chosen,[136] each having its own distinct ceremonial and procedure appointed by the gods themselves. That the religious feelings of the Greeks were associated in the most intimate manner with particular localities, has already been often remarked; and Drako proceeded agreeably to them in his arrangements for mitigating the indiscriminate condemnation of every man found guilty of homicide, which was unavoidable so long as the areopagus remained the only place of trial. The man who either confessed, or was proved to have shed the blood of another, could not be acquitted, or condemned to less than the full penalty (of death or perpetual exile, with confiscation of property) by the judges on the hill of Arês, whatever excuse he might have to offer: but the judges at the palladium and delphinium might hear him, and even admit his plea, without contracting the taint of irreligion. Drako did not directly meddle with, nor indeed ever mention, the judges sitting in areopagus.

[132] Dêmosthen. cont. Euerg. et Mnêsib. p. 1161.

[133] Dêmosthen. cont. Aristokrat. p. 647. τοσούτοις
δικαστηρίοις, ἃ θεοὶ κατέδειξαν, καὶ μετὰ ταῦτα ἄνθρωποι χρῶνται
πάντα τὸν χρόνον, p. 643.—οἱ ταῦτ᾽ ἐξαρχῆς τὰ νόμισμα διαθέντες,
οἵτινές ποθ᾽ ἦσαν, εἴθ᾽ ἥρωες, εἴτε θεοί. See also the Oration
cont. Makartat. p. 1069; Æschin. cont. Ktesiphon. p. 636; Antiph.
De Cæde Herodis, c. 14.

The popular dikastery, in the age of Isokratês and Dêmosthenês,
held sittings ἐπὶ Παλλαδίῳ for the trial of charges of
unintentional homicide,—a striking evidence of the special
holiness of the place for that purpose (see Isokrat. cont.
Kallimachum, Or. xviii, p. 381; Dêmosth. cont. Neær. p. 1348).

The statement of Pollux (viii, 125), that the ephetæ became
despised, is not confirmed by the language of Dêmosthenês.

[134] Plutarch, Solon, c. 19; Aristot. Polit. ii, 9, 2.

[135] Read on this subject the maxims laid down by Plato (Legg.
xii, p. 941). Nevertheless, Plato copies, to a great degree,
the arrangements of the ephetic tribunals in his provisions for
homicide (Legg. ix. pp. 865-873).

[136] I know no place in which the special aptitude of particular
localities consecrated each to its own purpose, is so powerfully
set forth, as in the speech of Camillus against the transfer of
Rome to Veii (Livy, v, 52).

In respect to homicide, then, the Drakonian ordinances were partly a reform of the narrowness, partly a mitigation of the rigor, of the old procedure; and these are all that have come down to us, having been preserved unchanged from the religious respect of the Athenians for antiquity on this peculiar matter. The rest of his ordinances are said to have been repealed by Solon, on account of their intolerable severity. So they doubtless appeared, to the Athenians of a later day, who had come to measure offences by a different scale; and even to Solon, who had to calm the wrath of a suffering people in actual mutiny.

That under this eupatrid oligarchy and severe legislation the people of Attica were sufficiently miserable, we shall presently see, when I recount the proceedings of Solon: but the age of democracy had not yet begun, and the government received its first shock from the hands of an ambitious eupatrid who aspired to the despotism. Such was the phase, as has been remarked in the preceding chapter, through which, during the century now under consideration, a large proportion of the Grecian governments passed.

Kylôn, an Athenian patrician, who superadded to a great family position the personal celebrity of a victory at Olympia, as runner in the double stadium, conceived the design of seizing the acropolis and constituting himself despot. Whether any special event had occurred at home to stimulate this project, we do not know: but he obtained both encouragement and valuable aid from his father-in-law Theagenês of Megara, who, by means of his popularity with the people, had already subverted the Megarian oligarchy, and become despot of his native city. Previous to so hazardous an attempt, however, Kylôn consulted the Delphian oracle, and was advised by the god in reply, to take the opportunity of “the greatest festival of Zeus” for seizing the acropolis. Such expressions, in the natural interpretation put upon them by every Greek, designated the Olympic games in Peloponnesus,—to Kylôn, moreover himself an Olympic victor, that interpretation came recommended by an apparent peculiar propriety. But Thucydidês, not indifferent to the credit of the oracle, reminds his readers that no question was asked nor any express direction given, _where_ the intended “greatest festival of Zeus” was to be sought,—whether in Attica or elsewhere,—and that the public festival of the Diasia, celebrated periodically and solemnly in the neighborhood of Athens, was also denominated the “greatest festival of Zeus Meilichius.” Probably no such exegetical scruples presented themselves to any one, until after the miserable failure of the conspiracy; least of all to Kylôn himself, who, at the recurrence of the next ensuing Olympic games, put himself at the head of a force, partly furnished by Theagenês, partly composed of his friends at home, and took sudden possession of the sacred rock of Athens. But the attempt excited general indignation among the Athenian people, who crowded in from the country to assist the archons and the prytanes of the naukrari in putting it down. Kylôn and his companions were blockaded in the acropolis, where they soon found themselves in straits for want of water and provisions; and though many of the Athenians went back to their homes, a sufficient besieging force was left to reduce the conspirators to the last extremity. After Kylôn himself had escaped by stealth, and several of his companions had died of hunger, the remainder, renouncing all hope of defence, sat down as suppliants at the altar. The archon Megaklês, on regaining the citadel, found these suppliants on the point of expiring with hunger on the sacred ground, and to prevent such a pollution, engaged them to quit the spot by a promise of sparing their lives. No sooner, however, had they been removed into profane ground, than the promise was violated and they were put to death: some even, who, seeing the fate with which they were menaced, contrived to throw themselves upon the altar of the venerable goddesses, or eumenides, near the areopagus, received their death-wounds in spite of that inviolable protection.[137]

[137] The narrative is given in Thucyd. i, 126; Herod. v, 71;
Plutarch, Solon, 12.

Though the conspiracy was thus put down, and the government upheld, these deplorable incidents left behind them a long train of calamity,—profound religious remorse mingled with exasperated political antipathies. There still remained, if not a considerable Kylonian party, at least a large body of persons who resented the way in which the Kylonians had been put to death, and who became in consequence bitter enemies of Megaklês the archon, and of the great family of the Alkmæônidæ, to which he belonged. Not only Megaklês himself and his personal assistants were denounced as smitten with a curse, but the taint was supposed to be transmitted to his descendants, and we shall hereafter find the wound reopened, not only in the second and third generation, but also two centuries after the original event.[138] When we see that the impression left by the proceeding was so very serious, even after the length of time which had elapsed, we may well believe that it was sufficient, immediately afterwards, to poison altogether the tranquillity of the state. The Alkmæônids and their partisans long defied their opponents, resisting any public trial,—and the dissensions continued without hope of termination, until Solon, then enjoying a lofty reputation for sagacity and patriotism, as well as for bravery, persuaded them to submit to judicial cognizance,—at a moment so far distant from the event, that several of the actors were dead. They were accordingly tried before a special judicature of three hundred eupatrids, Myrôn, of the deme Phlyeis, being their accuser. In defending themselves against the charge that they had sinned against the reverence due to the gods and the consecrated right of asylum, they alleged that the Kylonian suppliants, when persuaded to quit the holy ground, had tied a cord round the statue of the goddess and clung to it for protection in their march; but on approaching the altar of the eumenides, the cord accidentally broke,—and this critical event, so the accused persons argued, proved that the goddess had herself withdrawn from them her protecting hand and abandoned them to their fate.[139] Their argument, remarkable as an illustration of the feelings of the time, was not, however, accepted as an excuse: they were found guilty, and while such of them as were alive retired into banishment, those who had already died were disinterred and cast beyond the borders. Yet their exile, continuing as it did only for a time, was not held sufficient to expiate the impiety for which they had been condemned. The Alkmæônids, one of the most powerful families in Attica, long continued to be looked upon as a tainted race,[140] and in cases of public calamity were liable to be singled out as having by their sacrilege drawn down the judgment of the gods upon their countrymen.[141]

[138] Aristophan. Equit. 445, and the Scholia; Herodot. v, 70.

[139] Plutarch, Solon, c. 12. If the story of the breaking of the
cord had been true, Thucydidês could hardly have failed to notice
it; but there is no reason to doubt that it was the real defence
urged by the Alkmæônids.

When Ephesus was besieged by Crœsus, the inhabitants sought
protection to their town by dedicating it to Artemis: they
carried a cord from the walls of the town to the shrine of the
goddess, which was situated without the walls (Herod. i, 26).
The Samian despot Polykratês, when he consecrated to the Delian
Apollo the neighboring island of Rhêneia, connected it with the
island of Delos by means of a chain (Thucyd. iii, 104).

These analogies illustrate the powerful effect of visible or
material continuity on the Grecian imagination.

[140] Herodot. i, 61.

[141] See Thucyd. v, 16, and his language respecting Pleistoanax
of Sparta.

Nor was the banishment of the guilty parties adequate in other respects to restore tranquillity. Not only did pestilential disorders prevail, but the religious susceptibilities and apprehensions of the Athenian community also remained deplorably excited: they were oppressed with sorrow and despondency, saw phantoms and heard supernatural menaces, and felt the curse of the gods upon them without abatement.[142] In particular, it appears that the minds of the women—whose religious impulses were recognized generally by the ancient legislators as requiring watchful control—were thus disturbed and frantic. The sacrifices offered at Athens did not succeed in dissipating the epidemic, nor could the prophets at home, though they recognized that special purifications were required, discover what were the new ceremonies capable of appeasing the divine wrath. The Delphian oracle directed them to invite a higher spiritual influence from abroad, and this produced the memorable visit of the Kretan prophet and sage Epimenidês to Athens.

[142] Plutarch, Solon, c. 12. Καὶ φόβοι τινὲς ἐκ δεισιδαιμονίας
ἅμα καὶ φάσματα κατεῖχε τὴν πόλιν, etc.

The century between 620 and 500 B. C. appears to have been remarkable for the first diffusion and potent influence of distinct religious brotherhoods, mystic rites, and expiatory ceremonies, none of which, as I have remarked in a former chapter, find any recognition in the Homeric epic. To this age belong Thalêtas, Aristeas, Abaris, Pythagoras, Onomakritus, and the earliest provable agency of the Orphic sect.[143] Of the class of men here noticed, Epimenidês, a native of Phæstus or Knossus in Krete,[144] was one of the most celebrated,—and the old legendary connection between Athens and Krete, which shows itself in the tales of Theseus and Minos, is here again manifested in the recourse which the Athenians had to this island to supply their spiritual need. Epimenidês seems to have been connected with the worship of the Kretan Zeus, in whose favor he stood so high as to receive the denomination of the new Kurête[145]—the Kurêtes having been the primitive ministers and organizers of that worship. He was said to be the son of the nymph Baltê; to be supplied by the nymphs with constant food, since he was never seen to eat; to have fallen asleep in his youth in a cave, and to have continued in this state without interruption for fifty-seven years; though some asserted that he remained all this time a wanderer in the mountains, collecting and studying medicinal botany in the vocation of an Iatromantis, or leech and prophet combined. Such narratives mark the idea entertained by antiquity of Epimenidês, the Purifier,[146] who was now called in to heal both the epidemic and the mental affliction prevalent among the Athenian people, in the same manner as his countryman and contemporary Thalêtas had been, a few years before, invited to Sparta to appease a pestilence by the effect of his music and religious hymns.[147] The favor of Epimenidês with the gods, his knowledge of propitiatory ceremonies, and his power of working upon the religious feeling, was completely successful in restoring both health and mental tranquillity at Athens. He is said to have turned out some black and white sheep on the areopagus, directing attendants to follow and watch them, and to erect new altars to the appropriate local deities on the spots where the animals lay down.[148] He founded new chapels and established various lustral ceremonies; and more especially, he regulated the worship paid by the women, in such a manner as to calm the violent impulses which had before agitated them. We know hardly anything of the details of his proceeding, but the general fact of his visit, and the salutary effects produced in removing the religious despondency which oppressed the Athenians, are well attested: consoling assurances and new ritual precepts, from the lips of a person supposed to stand high in the favor of Zeus, were the remedy which this unhappy disorder required. Moreover, Epimenidês had the prudence to associate himself with Solon, and while he thus doubtless obtained much valuable advice, he assisted indirectly in exalting the reputation of Solon himself, whose career of constitutional reform was now fast approaching. He remained long enough at Athens to restore completely a more comfortable tone of religious feeling, and then departed, carrying with him universal gratitude and admiration, but refusing all other reward, except a branch from the sacred olive-tree in the acropolis.[149] His life is said to have been prolonged to the unusual period of one hundred and fifty-four years, according to a statement which was current during the time of his younger contemporary Xenophanês of Kolophon;[150] and the Kretans even ventured to affirm that he lived three hundred years. They extolled him not merely as a sage and a spiritual purifier, but also as a poet,—very long compositions on religious and mythical subjects being ascribed to him; according to some accounts, they even worshipped him as a god. Both Plato and Cicero considered Epimenidês in the same light in which he was regarded by his contemporaries, as a prophet divinely inspired, and foretelling the future under fits of temporary ecstasy: but according to Aristotle, Epimenidês himself professed to have received from the gods no higher gift than that of divining the unknown phenomena of the past.[151]

[143] Lobeck, Aglaophamus, ii, p. 313; Hoeckh, Kreta, iii, 2, p.
252.

[144] The statements respecting Epimenidês are collected and
discussed in the treatise of Heinrich, Epimenides aus Kreta.
Leipsic, 1801.

[145] Diogen. Laërt. i, 114, 115.

[146] Plutarch, Solon, c. 12; Diogen. Laërt. i, 109-115; Pliny,
H. N. vii, 52. θεοφιλὴς καὶ σοφὸς περὶ τὰ θεῖα τὴν ἐνθουσιαστικὴν
καὶ ~τελεστικὴν σοφίαν~, etc. Maxim. Tyrius, xxxviii, 3, δεινὸς
τὰ θεῖα, οὐ μαθὼν ἀλλ᾽ ὕπνον αὐτῷ διηγεῖτο μακρὸν καὶ ὄνειρον
διδάσκαλον.

Ἰατρόμαντις, Æschyl. Supplic. 277; Καθαρτὴς, Iamblichus, Vit.
Pythagor. c. 28.

Plutarch (Sept. Sapient. Conviv. p. 157) treats Epimenidês
simply as having lived up to the precepts of the Orphic life, or
vegetable diet: to this circumstance, I presume, Plato (Legg.
iii, p. 677) must be understood to refer, though it is not very
clear. See the Fragment of the lost _Krêtes_ of Euripides, p. 98,
ed. Dindorf.

Karmanor of Tarrha in Krete had purified Apollo himself for the
slaughter of Pytho (Pausan. ii, 30, 3).

[147] Plutarch, De Musicâ, pp. 1134-1146; Pausanias, i, 14, 3.

[148] Cicero (Legg. ii, 11) states that Epimenidês directed a
temple to be erected at Athens to Ὕβρις and Ἀναίδεια (Violence
and Impudence): Clemens said that he had erected _altars_ to the
same two goddesses (Protrepticon, p. 22): Theophrastus said that
there were _altars_ at Athens (without mentioning Epimenidês) to
these same (ap. Zenobium, Proverb. Cent. iv, 36). Ister spoke
of a ἱερὸν Ἀναιδείας at Athens (Istri Fragm. ed. Siebelis, p.
62). I question whether this story has any other foundation than
the fact stated by Pausanias, that the stones which were placed
before the tribunal of areopagus, for the accuser and the accused
to stand upon, were called by these names,—Ὕβρεως, that of the
accused; Ἀναιδείας, that of the accuser (i, 28, 5). The confusion
between stones and altars is not difficult to be understood. The
other story, told by Neanthês of Kyzikus, respecting Epimenidês,
that he had offered two young men as human sacrifices, was
distinctly pronounced to be untrue by Polemo: and it reads
completely like a romance (Athenæus, xiii, p. 602).

[149] Plutarch. Præcept. Reipubl. Gerend. c. 27, p. 820.

[150] Diogen. Laërt. _l. c._

[151] Plato, Legg. i, p. 642; Cicero, De Divinat. i, 18; Aristot.
Rhet. iii, 17.

Plato places Epimenidês ten years before the Persian invasion
of Greece, whereas his real date is near upon 600 B. C.; a
remarkable example of carelessness as to chronology.

The religious mission of Epimenidês to Athens, and its efficacious as well as healing influence on the public mind, deserve notice as characteristics of the age in which they occurred.[152] If we transport ourselves two centuries forward, to the Peloponnesian war, when rational influences and positive habits of thought had acquired a durable hold upon the superior minds, and when practical discussions on political and judicial matters were familiar to every Athenian citizen, no such uncontrollable religious misery could well have subdued the entire public; and if it had, no living man could have drawn to himself such universal veneration as to be capable of effecting a cure. Plato,[153] admitting the real healing influence of rites and ceremonies, fully believed in Epimenidês as an inspired prophet during the past; but towards those who preferred claims to supernatural power in his own day, he was not so easy of faith. He, as well as Euripides and Theophrastus, treated with indifference, and even with contempt, the orpheotelestæ of the later times, who advertised themselves as possessing the same patent knowledge of ceremonial rites, and the same means of guiding the will of the gods, as Epimenidês had wielded before them. These orpheotelestæ unquestionably numbered a considerable tribe of believers, and speculated with great effect, as well as with profit to themselves, upon the timorous consciences of rich men:[154] but they enjoyed no respect with the general public, or with those to whose authority the public habitually looked up. Degenerate as they were, however, they were the legitimate representatives of the prophet and purifier from Knossus, to whose presence the Athenians had been so much indebted two centuries before: and their altered position was owing less to any falling off in themselves, than to an improvement in the mass upon whom they sought to operate. Had Epimenidês himself come to Athens in those days, his visit would probably have been as much inoperative to all public purposes as a repetition of the stratagem of Phyê, clothed and equipped as the goddess Athênê, which had succeeded so completely in the days of Peisistratus,—a stratagem which even Herodotus treats as incredibly absurd, although, a century before his time, both the city of Athens and the demes of Attica had obeyed, as a divine mandate, the orders of this magnificent and stately woman, to restore Peisistratus.[155]

[152] Respecting the characteristics of this age, see the second
chapter of the treatise of Heinrich, above alluded to, Kreta und
Griechenland in Hinsicht auf Wunderglauben.

[153] Plato, Kratylus, p. 405; Phædr. p. 244.

[154] Eurip. Hippolyt. 957; Plato, Republ. ii, p. 364;
Theophrast. Charact. c. 16.

[155] Herodot. i, 60.